The Set-Up
by ammiva
Summary: "You. Me. Dessert. A bed with a mirror over it. Clearly someone is trying to set us up." Will the set-up work? AU; D/H; one-shot


The Set-Up

A rather large group had gathered in the hallway around a closed green door. People of all shapes, sizes, and colors huddled close together so as to be most directly in front of the door. Some looked in fear at the tall slab of wood while others were wide-eyed in anxious expectation. Yet others stood with twinkling eyes and smiles alight in evident amusement. At random intervals loud crashes and raised voices penetrated the door to the outer hallway. They leaned in to each other and whispered frantically while gesticulating towards the mysterious door regrettably closed to their view. Comments of "Not again" and "This is getting ridiculous" were juxtaposed against the loudest comment of all—"Maybe they'll just kill each other this time!"

A young woman in a smart, crisp blue work robe walked purposefully through the office, a small stack of books resting lightly against her hip. She brought a hand up to brush a stray curl out of her eyes as she rounded the corner to the hallway. She stopped abruptly, her hand halfway to her bright auburn red hair, as she took in the large group congregated in front of the green door. With a knowing sigh she lowered her hand and gently pushed her way through the gossiping gaggle.

"Don't tell me," she said as she reached the closed door. "They're at it again."

"Right in one, Ginny," a dark haired Irish man said grinning at the redhead. Just then a loud shattering crashed against the inside of the closed door. Muffled shouting ensued.

"Well," Ginny said exasperated, "who's going to break it up this time, Seamus? You or me?"

"No one's breaking it up," a perfectly coiffed brunette said from behind Ginny. She leaned against the wall directly opposite the door and smirked mischievously at Ginny and Seamus.

Ginny appraised the brunette's countenance which clearly shouted, _I know something you don't._ "Okay, Lavender," she said surrenderingly, "you've reeled me in. So, tell me, why is no one breaking it up?"

Lavender straightened up and moved away from the wall, closing in on her catch. "Because, dear Ginny, we are all tired of this silly little dance of theirs, and we want them to resolve this once and for all."

"What dance of theirs? And how will their prolonged fighting solve anything?" Ginny glanced suspiciously between Lavender and Seamus who both wore identical looks of conspiracy.

"Oh honestly, Ginny, tell me you can't just feel the sexual tension radiating off of those two." Seamus wiggled his eyebrows for effect.

Ginny stood gobsmacked for a moment before regaining her ability to speak. "Sexual…oh, come off it, you meddling people. They hate each other. They've hated each other for years."

Lavender looked disappointedly at Ginny. "Ginny, Ginny, Ginny," she condescended. "You poor, deluded soul. When will you ever accept the fact that your brother and our favorite, most illustrious boss are not meant for each other?"

"What? And she and our least favorite prat-boss are?" she asked incredulously. "I repeat, they hate each other."

"That may be so, but there _is_ a fine line between love and hate." Lavender removed a tiny piece of lint from her immaculate black robe with an unconcerned air. At Ginny's unconvinced look she added, "Unless, of course, you'd rather she get her cute little hands on that handsome green eyed interest of yours. I believe you've had your eye on him as long as our bosses have hated each other." Lavender looked demurely at Ginny through lowered lashes.

Ginny shifted uncomfortably under Lavender's heavily-guised manipulative stare. She weighed the options: her best friend and Prat-Boy, or her best friend and Harry? She swallowed guiltily and, losing her resolve, asked, "Okay, so what's the plan?"

Lavender perked up and began to spill the plans conspiratorially. "Okay, so it's like this. She picks up everything breakable, as usual. He ducks, as usual. _But_," she emphasized the word, "he just brought in a new glass dragon figure. A gift from his mother. He won't let her smash that, so he'll try to wrestle it from her to save it." She glanced over at Seamus who returned a sly wink.

"And then?" Ginny prodded impatiently.

"And then, my dear," Lavender proceeded in a silky voice, "they are whisked away to a secluded paradise until they cross the line from hate to love."

Ginny looked expectantly at Lavender. After a moment of disappointing silence her face fell into skepticism. "That's it? That's your 'plan?'" At Lavender's continued silence Ginny rolled her eyes. "And what will any of this accomplish? Sentencing my best friend to eternal banishment? Because it will _take_ an eternity for those two to fall in love."

Lavender clicked her tongue disapprovingly. "Now, now, I think you are missing the point completely."

"Oh, I'm sorry. Is there a point in all this rubbish?" Ginny asked.

"Okay, Ginny, it's like this," Seamus said stepping between the two girls. "They both grab onto the portkey, the glass dragon, which will activate immediately at their simultaneous touch. It will transport them to a room in the dungeons of Hogwarts—a room with no windows, no doors, and no escape."

"It's set up with a stocked pantry, self-replenishing desserts laced with an aphrodisiac, and a heart shaped bed with satin sheets." Lavender sighed dreamily.

Ginny looked, and felt, horror struck.

"Er, the real point, though," Seamus began warily at seeing Ginny's face, "is that they will have 48 hours to settle their differences without any interruptions."

"Seamus," Ginny began coolly, "do you really think that 48 hours will erase 12 years of insults, malice, and pure, unadulterated hatred?"

To punctuate her comment, a heavy thud pounded against the closed door, an indistinct groan muffling past the thick wood.

Seamus looked unnerved and stepped unconsciously away from the door. "Honestly," he said with slight hesitation, "I don't know. But we can always hope, right? I mean, you have to admit, their constant fighting is unhealthy, for us as well as them. I had to dodge a coffee mug once!"

Ginny bit her lip and furrowed her brow in concentration. "Well, the stress around here _is_ a bit much. I suppose it would be nice if they could at least get along a little." She then turned to Lavender. "But aphrodisiacs?"

"A fine line," Lavender reassured her. "A _very_ fine line."

"Okay," Ginny said seriously, "how will we know if it works? Wait it out for 2 days and see if they come back alive or not?"

"You see that rose?" Lavender indicated a small table at the opposite end of the hall. On it sat a clear glass vase encasing a drooping rose. "That is our indicator. As long as it stays wilted we'll know they still hate each other. If it comes back to life we'll know they've made progress."

"What kind of spell can do that?" Ginny asked.

"The Love-Hate spell, calibrated specifically to the two of them. I got the idea from Hermione herself. The girl's a living, breathing encyclopedia." Lavender noticed Ginny's raised eyebrow and added, "She thinks it's for Seamus and Pansy."

"What?" Seamus interjected. "As if."

Ginny and Lavender shared a small smile.

"Right. So what do we do now?" Ginny turned towards the green door and waited for the next thud, shatter, or smash, but it never came.

The entire hallway became deathly silent, each member of the crowd waiting for any sound from beyond the closed door.

After a minute of complete silence, Lavender broke the still air with a whispered voice. "The Portkey must have activated. I can't hear anything." A few more moments passed before she quietly ventured, "Well, now we wait."

The three looked at the wilting rose down the hall and waited as the surrounding crowd dispersed. When they were the only ones left in the hallway Lavender and Seamus both smiled at Ginny.

"Set your clocks, my pretties," Lavender said jovially. "48 hours."

"And if it doesn't work?" Ginny looked back and forth between her two co-conspirators.

"If it doesn't work," Lavender said unconcernedly, "the spell can be traced back to Clive Nielsen. Clumsy boy can't keep track of his wand for anything." With that she flitted proudly down the hall trailed closely by Seamus.

Ginny looked at the door once more before closing her eyes and bemoaning, "Oh boy, Hermione's going to kill me when she finds out."

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~

"What the…?"

Two people cleaved desperately onto a small glass object as they whipped mercilessly around the raging vortex of a Portkey's whirlwind. After an interminable amount of time the whirlwind slowed and deposited its occupants onto a plush plum colored rug in a stone walled room. Their feet plummeted onto the floor, the velocity of their bodies' motion thrusting them off-balance and landing them unceremoniously in a heap of limbs on the rug.

"Ugh," they groaned in unison.

A blond with cool gray eyes disentangled himself from his traveling companion and pulled himself to standing, his eyes surveying his new unfamiliar surroundings. "What is going on?" he asked aloud in unmasked confusion.

The room's other occupant sat up from her resting place on the rug and also gave the room a visual once-over. "I have no idea." Her eyes darted around the room inspecting every nuance. She ran a slim hand through her bushy wind-blown tresses and made a verbal checklist of what had just happened. "Okay, so we were in your office and I had just picked up a glass dragon and almost dropped it." She held up her hand and inspected said object closely. "Nice, by the way."

In a moment the glass figure was swiftly plucked from her hand. "You careless woman! My mother gave this to me. It belonged to my great-great-grandfather. You don't mess with genealogical artifacts."

"Your mother gave you a Portkey?"

He looked at her as though he could see her intelligence leaking out through her ears. "No. My mother gave me a glass dragon. Someone _else_ made it a Portkey. Care to make any confessions?"

"Hardly," she sniffed imperiously. "I never touched your dragon."

He graced her with a smirk and an indecent leer that made her blush to her roots. "Oh, really? Well, if you're a really good girl, I'll let you touch my dragon later."

"Stuff it, Malfoy," she grimaced.

"I'd love to, Granger," he replied. "But only if I get to choose where."

"Lovely," she said dryly. "And what are you thinking, bringing a 'genealogical artifact' to work, Mr. Brilliant?"

"My mother insisted," he defended. "She thought it would make a wonderfully ostentatious paper weight." He tucked the dragon figure safely in his robe. "A paper weight properly befitting of an esteemed co-chair such as myself," he added with an air of subtle imitation.

She gave him a withering look and turned to view the room again.

It was a simple room, but decorated rather elegantly. The room was entirely made of stone. On the walls hung several large, intricately woven tapestries depicting endless fields of flowers. A few smaller paintings of outdoor scenes were scattered between the tapestries. One painting in particular housed a swiftly running brook bisecting two banks of grass. Two sleek palominos wandered in and out of the painting, galloping the length of the brook and then pausing to dip their noses in the babbling current. They looked up briefly as Hermione watched them, but soon returned to galloping along the grassy banks.

Along one wall of the room ran a huge fireplace. It looked large enough to hold three side-by-side Hagrids, Hermione mused. Just in front of the fireplace sat a shiny maple coffee table. Behind the coffee table a plush taupe couch with fluffy plum and sage colored pillows stood regally in the light of the fireplace's dancing flames.

Hermione stood up from the rug between the coffee table and the fireplace to view the rest of the room. On the right side of the room behind the couch was a long oval dining table with two padded high-backed chairs facing across from each other. In the center of the table lay many large serving platters, each bearing countless decadent desserts longing to be sampled. Hermione's stomach grumbled quietly at the sight of the over-stacked platters.

She then looked to the wall across from the dining table and sucked in a gasp. The sight that greeted her eyes was very unexpected and, truth be told, slightly obscene. She blinked absently and stared at a huge heart-shaped bed.

The bed was draped in a fluffy, rich satin duvet with bold plum flowers spread across a creamy taupe background. The covers were turned down to reveal coordinating satin plum sheets. Atop the sheets numerous overstuffed pillows were scattered promising plush comfort. At the foot of the bed lay a silver tray holding assorted oil filled bottles, a jar of what appeared to be chocolate sauce, and a single feather. Hermione made to roll her eyes but stopped when she spied something shining over the bed. Her mouth dropped as she realized she was seeing a reflection of the firelight in a massive circular mirror hanging directly over the bed.

Hermione stood entirely motionless, completely aghast at what she was seeing. Finally, a low chuckle seized her attention and she turned to look at the source of the mirth.

"What's so funny, Malfoy?" she said, turning a brilliant shade of crimson.

He looked at her with a genuine smile on his face. "Tell me you don't find this even remotely humorous."

"What could possibly be humorous about this situation?" she asked. "We are Merlin knows where, sent by Merlin knows who, and, if you hadn't noticed, there are no doors or windows!"

"Hey, calm down," he said, noticing her increasingly rapid breathing. "All I meant was that in any other situation this would be quite funny."

"Oh? And how do you figure?" she asked challengingly.

"You. Me. Dessert. A bed with a mirror over it. Clearly someone is trying to set us up." He walked over to the bed and touched the satin duvet.

"Set us up?" she repeated. "But who?"

"I don't know," he answered honestly. "But who am I to turn down their perfectly crafted desserts?" He then proceeded to the dining table. Just as he reached for a fruit and cream filled tart a sparkling white envelope caught his eye. "Hmm," he intoned. "I may have found a clue."

Hermione rushed to his side as he broke the seal and extracted a sheet of parchment. He unfolded the letter and began to read.

"_Dear Hermione and Draco,_

"_Welcome to some much needed rest and relaxation. We hope you enjoy your accommodations as they will play home to you for the next 48 hours. We hope that in that time you will be able to resolve your differences and put aside any malice towards one another. You may think it extreme, but we feel it has come to this. Please take this time to reevaluate your feelings for each other. Remember, there is a fine line between love and hate. We will know if you have made any progress. Ciao, loves."_

Hermione and Draco continued to stare at the parchment for a moment before erupting into raucous laughter. They looked at each other and laughed even harder. Draco held his side while Hermione wiped tears from her eyes. As their laughter began to subside they both looked around the room, trying to regain their normal breathing.

"So, who do you think did this?" Draco asked, a small smile still playing across his lips.

"I'm not sure," Hermione answered. "But I'd be willing to put money on Lavender Brown. She would have needed help, though."

"True. This took some planning."

"So," Hermione ventured, moving closer to the bed, "our fighting finally drove them to extremes."

"Seems like it," Draco agreed.

Hermione lightly stroked the satin duvet and marveled at its feel.

"How do you think they intend to find out if we've made any progress?"

Hermione shrugged and turned her head to look at her reflection in the mirror. "Interesting angle," she commented. Just as she was about to look away something caught her eye. Reflecting on the edge of the mirror was a small cylindrical glass vase. She turned her head to the wall opposite the fireplace and saw a small glass sconce hanging unobtrusively on the wall beside a deep red tapestry. In the vase drooped a single wilting rose. She walked over to it and looked closely at the rose.

"Strange, isn't it? Everything is so perfectly planned and placed, yet this flower is wilting?" She continued to study the rose.

Draco walked to the rose and stood next to her. "It reminds me of that constantly wilted rose at the end of the office hallway. What's with the wilted roses anyway?"

In a flash of epiphany she rolled her eyes and said, "Of course. The Love-Hate spell."

"The what?" Draco questioned.

"The Love-Hate spell converts a living thing into a type of mood indicator. It can turn this rose into a spy. When the mood is angry or malicious it wilts. When the mood is happy or loving it blooms. This rose is linked to the one back in the office. Our mood here will transmit back to the rose there." Hermione shook her head. "Very clever," she admitted.

"And Brown knows how to properly cast the spell?" Draco asked skeptically. "It seems rather intricate."

"It is," Hermione concurred. "That's why she came to me about it."

"She came to _you_?" Draco inquired.

"Yes," Hermione answered. "Some rubbish about setting up Seamus and Pansy."

"Seamus and Pansy? That _is_ rubbish." Draco took in a deep breath. "So, now we know our culprit. Hey, what are you doing?"

While Draco talked, Hermione pulled out her wand and pointed it at the rose. She whispered a spell and the rose drooped even more. She then pocketed her wand and said, "That ought to do it."

"Do what?" Draco asked while watching her.

"Now the rose will stay wilted regardless of our mood. I already re-spelled the rose in the office last week. I had the distinct impression that I needed to. Now I know why. This one was just a precaution." She looked up and smiled at Draco. "I can't believe they went to all this trouble because of our fighting at work."

"Well," he slightly defended, "we _are_awfully disruptive—shouting, breaking things. I imagine our behavior drives them to distraction."

"True. Too true. It can't be easy to work for the co-chairs of the Magical Education Board." Hermione then turned and looked at the bed. "It's really too bad, you know."

"What is?" Draco asked, also turning his attention to the bed.

"They actually think they can push us together by making us stay here for 48 hours." She made a quiet tutting sound. "They went through so much trouble just to be disappointed." She slowly made her way towards the satin duvet.

"I agree. They really should know better than to try to push us." Draco very casually trailed behind Hermione.

Hermione splayed her fingers against the cool sheets in contemplation. "Maybe we should try to be nicer to each other in the office. It's the least we could do."

"Are you kidding?" Draco growled, his eyes flashing. "Then they've won."

"It's not about winning or losing," Hermione placated. "It's about decency."

"Decency?" Draco repeated questioningly. "Don't be daft. _Of course_ it's about winning." He circled in front of her until she was trapped between him and the bed. "I've got a thousand galleons that say we will hate each other until hell freezes over, and I believe hell freezing over was officially defined as the day Pansy and Weasley get together."

"Pansy and Ron?" Hermione asked disbelievingly. "Oh dear, that _is_ a long way in coming."

"So, as I see it," Draco continued, "our being nice to each other diminishes the hate factor, and Pansy and Ron aren't even close to dating yet."

"Oh, come on, Malfoy," Hermione chided. "What's a thousand galleons to you?"

"Nothing," he shrugged sulkily. "It's the principle."

"Sure." Hermione looked thoroughly unconvinced. She looked around the room once more while voicing aloud, "It's too bad all of their planning was wasted."

"Wasted?" Draco asked, taken aback. "Don't insult me."

_Thump!_

In an instant Hermione was sprawled on her back against the bed. She looked up at Draco with wide eyes.

"I told you they would do something like this if we continued on the way we were." His eyes twinkled as he stared down at her. "I think I deserve some gratitude."

"Gratitude? For what?" she asked, still staring wide eyed at him.

"For getting us an all-expense paid, uninterrupted weekend alone." He smirked triumphantly at her.

"All-expense paid…" she began incredulously. Then she shook her head and smirked back. "Cheapskate."

"Ingrate."

_Thump!_

The next moment Draco had landed on top of Hermione and captured her lips in a soft kiss, his hands roving up and down her sides. Immediately Hermione's arms wrapped around Draco, her hands tangling in his silky hair.

"Mmm," she murmured against his lips. "Too bad they'll never know their little set-up worked."

He smiled as he moved his lips down to nuzzle into her neck. "Uh-uh," he disagreed. "Too bad they'll never know _our_ little set-up worked."

She sighed contentedly as they continued to enjoy their well-planned "rest and relaxation."

The End

Author's note:

I found this amongst a box of other drabbles and ideas, completed and ready to share. I must have written it 5 or 6 years ago and completely forgotten about it. I figured I'd go ahead and share since it was finished. My other writings have been on hold and nearly extinguished, as have my heretofore creative ideas. If I can get my mojo back up and working properly, I hope to complete "A Heart Divided," but it has been so long (not even remotely kidding, as many of you are well aware), I can only hope. Until then, I hope you enjoy this little bit of fun.


End file.
